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Milwaukee
is the largest city in the state of Wisconsin, United States. The
city is located in the southeastern portion of the state on the
western shore of Lake Michigan. Current estimates in 2004 place
the greater Milwaukee metropolitan area population at roughly
1,600,000. The city's population is 596,974 as of 2000. The city
of Milwaukee is the 19th largest city in the United States.
Milwaukee is home to a few professional sports franchises;
Milwaukee Brewers, Major League Baseball, Milwaukee Bucks,
National basketball Association, Milwaukee Admiral, Ice Hockey,
Milwaukee Wave, Major League Soccer. The Milwaukee area was
originally inhabited by the Fox, Mascouten, Potawatomi, and
Winnebago Indian tribes. Milwaukee received its name from the
Indian word Millioke which is thought to have meant "The Good
Land", or "gathering place by the water". French missionaries and
traders passed through the area in the late 1600s and 1700s.
Milwaukee's most visually prominent cultural attraction is the
Milwaukee Art Museum, and especially its new $100 million wing
(including a moving sunscreen quite literally unfolds like the
wing of a bird), designed by Santiago Calatrava in his first
American commission. Milwaukee is also home to the Florentine
Opera, a symphony orchestra and a professional ballet company, as
well as boasting a number of theater companies. Milwaukee's
proximity to Lake Michigan causes a convection current to form
mid-afternoon, resulting in the so-called lake effect, causing the
temperatures to be warmer in the winter, and cooler in the summer.
Also, the relative humidity in the summer is far higher than that
of comparable cities at the same latitude, meaning that it feels
hotter than it really is. Notable Denizens of Milwaukee are;
Herbert Simon, Jack Kilby, Golda Meir, Lloyd Pettit, Jane Pettit
and Leroy Chiao. Milwaukee is the "City of Festivals." It has an
annual fair along the lakefront called Summerfest. Listed in the
Guinness Book of World Records as the largest music festival in
the world, Summerfest attracts around 900,000 visitors a year to
its twelve stages. Smaller festivals throughout the year celebrate
the city's German, Native American, Italian, Irish, and Polish
heritage. Colleges and Universities in Milwaukee are; Alverno
College, Cardinal Stritch University, Marquette University,
Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee Area Technical College,
Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, Milwaukee School of
Engineering, Mount Mary College, University of Wisconsin,
Milwaukee and Wisconsin Lutheran College. Although most people
associate Milwaukee's reputation with its breweries, today
companies like Miller Brewing employ less than one percent of the
city's workers. Milwaukee's reputation as a blue collar town is
more accurate, however, with 22 percent of the workforce involved
in manufacturing -- second only to San Jose, CA and far higher
than the national average of 16.5%. Service and managerial jobs
are the fastest growing segments of the Milwaukee economy, and
healthcare makes up 27% of all service jobs in the city. Milwaukee
is headquarters to six Fortune 1000 manufacturers and six Fortune
1000 service companies. |